2003年6月四级试题Part IIReading Comprehension(35 minutes)Passage OneQuestions 21 to 25 are based on the following passage:On average, American kids ages 3 to 12 spent 29 hours a week in school, eight hours more than they did in 1981. They also did more household work and participated in more of such organized activities as soccer and ballet (芭蕾舞). Involvement in sports, in particular, rose almost 50% from 1981 to 1997: boys now spend an average of four hours a week playing sports; girls log half that time. All in all, however, childrens leisure time dropped from 40% of the day in 1981 to 25%.“Children are affected by the same time crunch (危机) that affects their parents,” says Sandra Hofferth, who headed the recent study of childrens timetable. A chief reason, she says, is that more mothers are working outside the home. (Nevertheless, children in both double-income and “male breadwinner” households spent comparable mounts of time interacting with their parents, 19 hours and 22 hours respectively. In contrast, children spent only 9 hours with their single mothers.)All work and no play could make for some very messed-up kids. “Play is the most powerful way a child explores the world and learns about himself,” says T. Berry Brazelton, professor at Harvard Medical School. Unstructured play encourages independent thinking and allows the young to negotiate their relationships with their peers, but kids ages 3 to 12 spent only 12 hours a week engaged in it.The children sampled spent a quarter of their rapidly decreasing “free time” watching television. But that, believe it or not, was one of the findings parents might regard as good news. If theyre spending less time in front of the TV set, however, kids arent replacing it with reading. Despite efforts to get kids more interested in books, the children spent just over an hour a week reading. Lets face it, whos got the time?21.By mentioning “the same time crunch” (Line 1, Para. 2) Sandra Hofferth means _.A) children have little time to play with their parentsB) children are not taken good care of by their working parentsC) both parents and children suffer from lack of leisure timeD) both parents and children have trouble managing their time22.According to the author, the reason given by Sandra Hofferth for the time crunch is_.A) quite convincingB) partially trueC) totally groundlessD) rather confusing23.According to the author a child develops better if _.A) he has plenty of time reading and studyingB) he is left to play with his peers in his own wayC) he has more time participating in school activitiesD) he is free to interact with his working parents24.The author is concerned about the fact that American kids _.A) are engaged in more and more structured activitiesB) are increasingly neglected by their working mothersC) are spending more and more time watching TVD) are involved less and less in household work25.We can infer from the passage that _.A) extracurricular activities promote childrens intelligenceB) most children will turn to reading with TV sets switched offC) efforts to get kids interested in reading have been fruitfulD) most parents believe reading to be beneficial to childrenPassage TwoQuestions 26 to 30 are based on the following passage:Henry Ford, the famous U.S. inventor and car manufacturer, once said, The business of America is business.” By this he meant that the U.S. way of life is based on the values of the business world.Few would argue with Fords statement. A brief glimpse at a daily newspaper vividly shows how much people in the United States think about business. For example, nearly every newspaper has a business section, in which the deals and projects, finances and management, stock prices and labor problems of corporations are reported daily. In addition, business news can appear in every other section. Most national news has an important financial aspect to it. Welfare, foreign aid, the federal budget, and the policies of the Federal Reserve Bank are all heavily affected by business. Moreover, business news appears in some of the unlikeliest places. The world of arts and entertainment is often referred to as “the entertainment industry” or “show business.”The positive side of Henry Fords statement can be seen in the prosperity that business has brought to U.S. life. One of the most important reasons so many people from all over the world come to live in the United States is the dream of a better job. Jobs are produced in abundance (大量地) because the U.S. economic system is driven by competition. People believe that this system creates more wealth, more jobs, and a materially better way of life.The negative side of Henry Fords statement, however, can be seen when the word business is taken to mean big business. And the term bi